Politics: The rise of extremism
Are politicians of paying too much attention to the fringe elements of their parties?
With President Obama’s poll numbers slipping, the GOP should be enjoying a political resurgence right about now. “There’s just one problem: The country still doesn’t like Republicans,” said E.J. Dionne in The Washington Post. Polls find that only 28 percent of Americans have a favorable view of the GOP, and the reason is clear. Without a positive agenda of its own, the Right “is being defined by extremist voices”—from the “birthers” who insist Obama was born on foreign soil to “race-baiting” media bloviators like Glenn Beck of Fox News, who recently proclaimed that Obama “has a deep-seated hatred for white people.” Most Americans now see the Republicans as “a right-wing, Southern regional party” hostile to minorities, immigrants, women, city dwellers, and gays. America has always had its share of “loons,” said Leonard Pitts in The Miami Herald. “For Republicans, though, lunacy has become the show, a circus of extremism that now defines them.”
Actually, said David Paul Kuhn in Realclearpolitics.com, political extremism is a bipartisan disease. It’s true that a recent poll found that fully 28 percent of Republicans “believe that Barack Obama wasn’t born in the U.S.” But in 2007, another poll found that 35 percent of Democrats subscribed to the nutty theory that President Bush knew the U.S. was going to be attacked on 9/11. Neither party, it seems, “can wholly disavow their fanatical fringe,” for the simple reason that there are too many of these wackos, and politicians need the votes. Meanwhile, as the “fanatical fringe” on both sides of the spectrum segregate themselves with like-minded ideologues on the Web, and on Fox and MSNBC, they find the other side ever more alien and sinister. From this mutual incomprehension, outlandish conspiracy theories are born.
It was this growing polarization that made me quit politics, said Mickey Edwards, a former Republican member of Congress, in the Los Angeles Times. Parties can serve an important purpose, by bringing together people with similar values and interests. But we elect lawmakers to represent us by “voting according to their best judgment,” not to engage “in a never-ending battle between ‘my club’ and ‘your club.’” Yet on issues ranging from national security to health-care reform to Supreme Court nominations, Democratic and Republican lawmakers now vote in virtual lockstep; their primary loyalty isn’t to their constituents or to their consciences, but to their side. That’s not democracy, and it’s certainly not governance. It’s warfare.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
![https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516-320-80.jpg)
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
-
The week's best photos
In Pictures An Olympic training session, a cleaning crustacean and more
By Anahi Valenzuela, The Week US Published
-
The pros and cons of buying a fixer-upper
The Explainer Does it make sense to buy a home in need of a little TLC?
By Becca Stanek, The Week US Published
-
The origin and evolution of the Kamala Harris coconut meme
The Explainer You think it just fell out of a coconut tree?
By Theara Coleman, The Week US Published
-
How could J.D. Vance impact the special relationship?
Today's Big Question Trump's hawkish pick for VP said UK is the first 'truly Islamist country' with a nuclear weapon
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
Biden, Trump urge calm after assassination attempt
Speed Reads A 20-year-old gunman grazed Trump's ear and fatally shot a rally attendee on Saturday
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Supreme Court rejects challenge to CFPB
Speed Read The court rejected a conservative-backed challenge to the way the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is funded
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Arizona court reinstates 1864 abortion ban
Speed Read The law makes all abortions illegal in the state except to save the mother's life
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US Published
-
Trump, billions richer, is selling Bibles
Speed Read The former president is hawking a $60 "God Bless the USA Bible"
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
The debate about Biden's age and mental fitness
In Depth Some critics argue Biden is too old to run again. Does the argument have merit?
By Grayson Quay Published
-
How would a second Trump presidency affect Britain?
Today's Big Question Re-election of Republican frontrunner could threaten UK security, warns former head of secret service
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
'Rwanda plan is less a deterrent and more a bluff'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By The Week UK Published